I would like to start by extensively quoting excerpts from a recent article in the New York Times, "A Secret War, Strange New Wounds, and Silence from the Pentagon." by Dave Phillips.
"Many U.S. troops who fired vast numbers of artillery rounds against the Islamic State developed mysterious, life-shattering mental and physical problems. . . . (Noted later in the article:) The cannon blasts were strong enough to hurl a 100-pound round 15 miles, and each unleashed a shock wave that shot through the crew members' bodies, vibrating bone, punching lungs and hearts, and whipping at cruise-missile speeds through the most delicate organ of all, the brain. . . .)
"But the military struggled to understand what was wrong.
"When Lance Corporal Javier Ortiz came home from a secret mission in Syria, the ghost of a dead girl appeared to him in his kitchen. She was pale and covered in chalky dust, as if hit by an explosion, and her eyes stared at him with a glare as dark and heavy as oil.
"The 21-year-old Marine was part of an artillery gun crew that fought against the Islamic State, and he knew that his unit's huge cannons had killed hundreds of enemy fighters. The ghost, he was sure, was their revenge.
"A shiver went through him. He backed into another room in his apartment near Camp Pendleton in California and flicked on the lights, certain that he was imagining things. She was still there.
"A few days later, in the barracks not far away, a 22-year-old Marine named Austin Powell pounded on his neighbor's door in tears and stammered: 'There's something in my room! I'm hearing something in my room!'
"His neighbor, Brady Zipoy, 20, searched the room but found nothing.'It's all right I've been having problems, too,' Lance Corporal Zipoy said, tapping his head. The day before, he bent down to tie his boots and was floored by a sudden avalanche of emotion so overwhelming and bizarre that he had no words for it. 'We'll go see the doc,' he told his friend. 'We'll get help.'
"All through their unit Alpha Battery, 1st Battalion, 11th Marines troops came home feeling cursed. And the same thing was happening in other Marine and Army artillery units.
"An investigation by The New York Times found that many of the troops sent to bombard the Islamic State in 2016 and 2017 returned to the United States plagued by nightmares, panic attacks, depression and, in a few cases, hallucinations. Once-reliable Marines turned unpredictable and strange. Some are now homeless.. A striking number eventually died by suicide, or tried to . .
"When Lance Corporal Ortiz started seeing a ghost a few days after returning from Syria in 2017, it didn't occur to him that he had been hurt by his own cannon. Instead, he was convinced that the enemy had put a hex on him.
"He tried to purify himself by lighting a fire on the beach near Camp Pendleton and burning his old combat gloves and journal from the deployment. But after the ashes cooled, the ghost was still there . . .
"One Friday night in October 2020, he was having visions that ghosts were trying to pull him into another dimension . . .
"He has two young children, and has struggled to hold a job. Bills have piled up. The headaches are crushing, he said, and he feels that his memory is becoming worse. When asked about the apparition of the dead girl, he started to cry and lowered his voice so his wife wouldn't hear. He admitted that he still saw the ghost. And other things.
"'I gave the Marine Corps everything,' he said. 'And they spit me out with nothing. Damaged, damaged, very damaged.' . . .
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